South Africans would be no great loss

BY DUNCAN JOHNSTONE

The biggest loss to New Zealand rugby if South Africa do eventually exit Sanzar will be money - not the Springboks or their five Super rugby franchises.

With the three-way alliance in the process of trying to come up with a formula to present to their broadcasting partner News Ltd by June, speculation again mounts that South Africa are set to split.

It's not a new theory - it's been around for the better part of a decade because of the logistics involved in time-zones.

South Africa sit comfortably with the northern power houses and now the talk is that they could look that way and join the Magners League, a championship involving Welsh, Scottish and Irish clubs.

New Zealand is at an important junction as they look to find something fresh in a product that has been largely unchanged since 1996.

Persistent talk of expansion has been unheeded as the three countries have simply enlarged within their own boundaries, adding two Super teams and another round of the Tri-Nations.

More of the same is starting to have a stale look to it so for South Africa to disappear mightn't be the worst - except to the bank balance.

The South Africans, now even boasting world champion status, bring proven class to the table and a massive and energetic TV base, including a switched on broadcaster in TopSport.

To News Ltd is a valuable chunk of a three way equation.

The only form of compensation might be to finally break into the Asian scene and overcharge them for their playing product.

Similarly the Americas. The Pacific have the players but not the economics or the broadcasting logistics to make them financially appealing.

Not good enough for you? Then how about new Zealand thinking big and if South Africa is leaving England and France alone, then jump in bed with the real northern heavyweights and play a quadrangular tournament here midseason and complete it up there in November?

The word in South Africa is that the well connected former national administrator Rian Oberholzer is behind the dealings of this latest speculation from the republic, looking to reinvent a proposal that didn't quite come off in the late 1990s.

He may have an obvious connection in Wales now in the form of David Moffett - the Australia-New Zealand-England-Wales sporting administrator now back on the Welsh scene overseeing their provincial club scene, the very target of this latest speculation.

Moffett knows the ins and outs of Sanzar better than anyone now sitting outside that cloistered circle.

If there is a time to strike then it is now.

Sanzar have continued to show their vulnerability. It's a tricky equation acknowledge by New Zealand bosses. Their inability late last year to find common ground on a simple matter like expanding the finals series for this season spoke volumes.

South Africa's insistence then on a conference finals system that guaranteed their involvement in the trophy hunt also said plenty.

At Super Rugby they have been guilty of underachieving and at Tri-Nations level they haven't exactly been a consistent force either.

There's an argument to suggest that the annual meetings have taken some of the mystique out of All Blacks-Springboks encounters.

Cast them free and put them on the general calendar. Bring them in every two or three years. Let the Springboks tour New Zealand, let the All Blacks tour South Africa, bring back midweek matches. Charge the broadcasters more for that to make up a bit of the shortfall.

The Bledisloe Cup is an added stimulus to the All Blacks-Wallabies clashes that can't seem to be replicated by the Boks although even that massive piece of silverware is guilty of being overexposed now that it is being taken on the road.

The other complication with South Africa has always been the broadcast times and, as usual, New Zealand usually tend to get the thin end of the wedge.

Games in South Africa are often played in the afternoons - better conditions - and we suffer having to watch them in the middle of the night.

Games in New Zealand tend to be played in the evening - worse conditions - and the South Africans get to watch them over breakfast.

Sound fair?

Maybe it is time to get something going closer to home. The Springboks will always be there - there's too much history to let that waste away altogether.

What do think think? Is it time for a radical rethink of the Super 14 without South Africa? Post your comments below.

 

- © Fairfax NZ News